Asiatic Vespers
genocide which occurred prior to the First Mithridatic War
The Asiatic Vespers (also known as the Asian Vespers, Ephesian Vespers, or the Vespers of 88 BC) were massacres of Roman and other Latin-speaking peoples living in parts of western Anatolia c. early 88 BC by forces loyal to Mithridates VI Eupator, ruler of the Kingdom of Pontus, who orchestrated the massacre in an attempt to rid Asia Minor of Roman influence. An estimated 80,000 people were killed during the episode. The incident served as the casus belli or immediate cause of the First Mithridatic War between the Roman Republic and the Kingdom of Pontus. Some scholars and historians consider these massacres to be a case of genocide.
Background
In the 100s BC, Mithridates had continued to avoid confrontation with the Roman republic, which itself was occupied in the Jugurthine and Cimbric wars. However, due to Mithridates' subjugation of Armenia and other territories along the Black Sea, Roman attention fell on Pontus. With Nicomedes III of Bithynia, Mithridates saw an opportunity in 108–107 BC and partitioned Paphlagonia. A Roman embassy protested and demanded the two kings to withdraw, but was ignored.
A few years later, c. 102 BC, Nicomedes and Mithridates came into a dispute over Cappadocia: Nicomedes sent a garrison into the country and married its dowager queen, Laodice. After Mithridates attempted to assassinate the king of Cappadocia, Ariarathes VII Philometor, Ariarathes went to war.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Asiatic Vespers” as genocide which occurred prior to the First Mithridatic War. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the history & society register because the source frames it as genocide which occurred prior to the First Mithridatic War. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2037261. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Asiatic Vespers” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.